Armchair Concerts.
Broadcasts from Tchaikovsky Concert Hall

Effervescent musicianship, intense lyricism and beguiling tonal beauty belong to the qualities that have secured Sergej Krylov’s place among today’s most renowned performers. The Russian-born violinist directs breath-taking virtuosity to reveal profound expressive insights into the works in his strikingly broad repertoire.

«Sergej Krylov transfixed the house, fiddling with the kind of effortless lyricism, liquid flow and mercurial tones that distinguish the best violinists» observed THE TIMES, following last year performance of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Vasily Petrenko.

A regular guest with several major institutions and world’s leading orchestras, Sergej Krylov has appeared with, among others, the St Petersburg Philharmonic, London Philharmonic and Royal Philharmonic orchestras, Russian National Orchestra, Mariinsky Orchestra, Filarmonica della Scala, Accademia di Santa Cecilia, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, DSO Berlin, the Konzerthaus Orchester Berlin, Budapest Festival Orchestra, NHK Symphony Tokyo, Staatskapelle Dresden.

Among the prominent personalities with whom he has worked, Krylov’s friendship with Mstislav Rostropovich stands among the most important influences on his artistic life. Over the past decade he has collaborated with many leading conductors, from Mikhail Pletnev, Dmitri Kitajenko, Vasily Petrenko, Valery Gergiev, Andrey Boreyko and Vladimir Jurowski to Fabio Luisi, Roberto Abbado, Yuri Temirkanov, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Dmitry Liss, Yuri Bashmet and Michał Nesterowicz.

Recent and forthcoming highlights of Sergej Krylov’s 2018/19 season include performances of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with the Russian National Orchestra/M. Pletnev and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra/M. Alsop, Prokofiev’s First Violin Concerto with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra/S. Kochanovsky and Qatar Philharmonic/D. Kitajenko, Paganini’s Concerto n. 1 with the St Petersburg Philharmonic/C. Dutoit and Charlotte Symphony/R. Abbado next to concerts with the Gulbenkian Orchestra, Zagreb and Belgrade Philharmonic, the BBC Philharmonic, the Ural Philharmonic/Dmitry Liss and many others.

As Music Director of the Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra since 2008, Sergej Krylov loves assuming the dual role of soloist and conductor in a wide repertoire ranging from Baroque to contemporary music. Major engagements in 2018-19 include an important event at MUPA concert hall in Budapest, live recorded for TV and radio broadcast along with concerts in Italy, Poland, France and Lithuania.

Sergej Krylov devotes much time to chamber music projects, playing in partnership with pianists Denis Matsuev, Nikolai Lugansky, Boris Berezovsky, Itamar Golan, Michail Lifits and in larger chamber groups with artists such as Elena Bashkirova, Yuri Bashmet, Maxim Rysanov, Alexander Kniazev.

Born into a family of musicians in Moscow in 1970, Sergej Krylov began studying the violin at the age of five and completed his training at the Moscow Central School of Music. His international breakthrough came with first prize-winning success at the International Violin Competition “Rodolfo Lipizer”, the Stradivarius International Violin Competition and the Fritz Kreisler Competition.

In addition to early recordings for Melodiya and EMI, Krylov’s discography includes two recent releases on Deutsche Grammophon: the first, a recording of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons in the role of soloist and conductor with the Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra, the second, an album devoted to Paganini’s 24 Capricci. Both albums attracted critical plaudits. Last season Sergej Krylov premiered Ezio Bosso’s Violin Concerto with the Orchestra Filarmonica della Fenice, recorded live under the composer’s direction and released by SONY Classical. He recently recorded the Violin Concerto Metamorphosen under Krzysztof Penderecki’s direction as part of a landmark project to record the Polish composer’s complete works.

Boris Berezovsky has established a remarkable reputation, both as the most powerful of virtuoso pianists and as a musician of unique insight and sensitivity.

Born in Moscow in 1969, Boris Berezovsky studied at the Moscow Conservatoire with Eliso Virsaladze and privately with Alexander Satz. Following his London début at the Wigmore Hall in 1988, The Times described him as "an artist of exceptional promise, a player of dazzling virtuosity and formidable power"; two years later that promise was fulfilled when he won the Gold Medal at the 1990 International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow.

Boris Berezovsky works regularly as concerto soloist with orchestras including the Concertgebouw, Philharmonia Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Residentie Orkest, Danish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, NDR Hamburg, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Komische Oper, Hessischer Rundfunk, Russian National Orchestra, New Japan Philharmonic, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Dallas Symphony Orchestra and with conductors such as Kurt Masur, Charles Dutoit, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Alezander Lazarev, Andrew Litton, Mikhail Pletnev, Antonio Pappano etc.

Boris Berezovsky’s recent recordings of the complete Beethoven Concerti with the Swedish Chamber Orchestra with Thomas Dausgaard have been greeted with high critical acclaim. He has also made a considerable number of records for Teldec including solo discs of works by Chopin, Schumann, Rachmaninov, Mussorgsky, Balakirev, Medtner, Ravel, the complete Liszt Transcendental Studies and concertos by Rachmaninov, Tchaikovsky and Liszt. His recording of the Rachmaninov Sonata was awarded the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik and his Ravel disc was specially recommended by Le Monde de la Musique, Diapason, BBC Music Magazine and the Independent on Sunday. He released a live DVD of Liszt’s Transcendental Studies taken from a performance at La Roque d’Antheron for Naive. Mr Berezovsky embarked on a collaboration with Warner Classics with his CD of piano trios with Dmitri Makhtin and Alexander Kniazev, and his most recent recording of the Chopin/Godowsky’s Etudes received high critical acclaim winning the instrumental category of the first BBC Music Magazine Awards.

In recital and as a chamber musician Boris Berezovsky performs regularly in recital series and festivals world-wide. His forthcoming performances include a return to the QEH International Piano Series, the Concertgebouw, La Roque d’Antheron, Ruhr Piano Festival, Les Folles Journées de Nantes, Palais des Beaux Arts, Brussels, Megaron, Athens and Symphony Hall, Birmingham amongst others. He has a noted duo partnership with violinist Vadim Repin and Brigitte Engerer, and his piano trio performs throughout Europe at the highest level.

Radio and TV journalist Artyom Vargaftik was born in 1971 in Moscow. He studied at the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory’s Academic School of Music and the Gnessin Russian Academy of Music, then completed a postgraduate course at the Moscow Conservatory. He taught cello history at the Gnessin Academy of Music in 1997–2000 and was a trainer of music journalism in 2003–2006. 

While still a student, he began working on the radio as a correspondent, presenter, and creator of musical programs. His programs Orchestra Pit and Music Scores Never Burn on the Kultura TV channel brought him a wide recognition. Both projects were awarded with TEFI national television awards in 2003 and 2004, respectively.

From 1994 to 2003, Artyom Vargaftik worked as a music journalist on the Echo of Moscow radio, and since 2003 he has been a columnist for Kultura Radio and Radio of Russia. He has taken part in numerous festivals and concerts in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Nizhniy Novgorod, Novosibirsk, Samara, Saratov, Kazan, and other Russian cities. He has been a regular concert presenter at festivals led by Boris Andrianov, such as Vivacello and Musical Expedition. 

In 2007, he began to collaborate with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra, and their active collaboration is still ongoing (in the 2021/22 season, Artyom is creating and hosting The Story of a Masterpiece series). Artyom Vargaftik is also a regular host of concert programs at the Moscow International House of Music.